| | Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genera of Lepidoptera-Noctuidae |
Adults. Head rough. Eyes glabrous; ciliated. Antennae of males shortly ciliate. Tongue well developed. Labial palps medium to long; ascending.
Wingspan 34–46 mm. Forewings brown and pinkish purple; purplish marked or tinged to rosy marked or tinged; complexly patterned; the patterning well marked (with pink basal fascia and a white-edged, pinkish purple submarginal band); exhibiting metallic-enamelled effects; reniform defined; orbicular defined; claviform undefined. Hindwings fuscous, or brownish, or grey; terminally darkened; without a clear discal mark; without transverse lines; exhibiting vein 5. Vein 5 of the hindwings strong; arising nearer to vein 4 than to vein 6; convergent on vein 4 near their bases. Thorax crested. Middle tibiae without spines. Posterior tibiae with spines; rough-scaled. Abdomen crested.
Living adults found in August.
Larvae, pupae. Ventral prolegs 4, or 6. Larvae feeding on Ranunculaceae - Aconitum, Thalictrum.
British representation. 1 species; Central-southern England and Ireland; variabilis* (Purple-shaded Gem).
Plusiinae.
Illustrations. • Euchalcia variabilis (Purple-shaded Gem): B. Ent. 731. • Euchalcia variabilis: B. Ent. 731, legend+text. • Euchalcia variabilis: B. Ent. 731, text cont.. • E. variabilis, with adventive or casual Plusiinae: Swain. 1, Syngrapha interrogationis (Scarce Silver Y); 2, Chrysodeixis chalcites (Golden Twin Spot); 3, Chrysodeixis acuta (Tunbridge Wells Gem); 4, Ctenoplusia limbirana (Scar Bank Gem); 5, Macdunnoughia confusa (Dewick's Plusia); 6, Euchalcia variabilis (Purple-shaded Gem); 7, Diachrysia orichalcea (Slender Burnished Brass). Swain, 1961.
We advise against extracting comparative information from the descriptions. This is much more easily achieved using the DELTA data files or the interactive key, which allows access to the character list, illustrations, full and partial descriptions, diagnostic descriptions, differences and similarities between taxa, lists of taxa exhibiting or lacking specified attributes, and distributions of character states within any set of taxa. See also Guidelines for using data taken from Web publications.
Cite this publication as: ‘Watson, L., and Dallwitz, M.J. 2003 onwards. Insects of Britain and Ireland: the genera of Lepidoptera-Noctuidae. Version: 14th February 2021. delta-intkey.com’.
